


Origami Security Guard

by Snow



Category: Lonely Security Guard (song)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Community: au_bingo, Don't Have to Know Canon, Gen, Mutant, Mutation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-02
Updated: 2010-07-02
Packaged: 2017-10-10 08:52:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 625
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/97869
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Snow/pseuds/Snow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Most of the people who mutated changed their jobs.  We hadn't been happy in the old ones, and we were better now.  But when I ran into a security guard who was more powerful than all the rest of us, he seemed content.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Origami Security Guard

**Author's Note:**

> Written for au_bingo, for the square Other: Mutants.
> 
> [Song Lyrics](http://www.lyricsmania.com/lonely_security_guard_lyrics_hayden.html)

Most of the people who mutated changed their jobs. We were better now. After all, we had powers that average humans did not. So I, for one, saw no point to staying as a paper-pusher when I could be a superhero. Or a supervillain.

It turned out that my particular mutations, extremely sensitive hearing and an ability not to show up on any kind of digital camera, were really useful for breaking into secure facilities. They were even more useful, even if they qualified as overkill, on less secure facilities.

My target tonight wasn't particularly secure at all, just a single security guard posted at the entrance. I was much more interested in the guard than I was in the contents of the store he was guarding.

The store was more up-scale than it should be for this neighborhood, selling diamond rings and gold bracelets.

The security guard himself didn't seem very concerned about the contents either. I'd been watching him for two days and despite his fierce demeanor all he had done was fold receipt after business card after receipt into origami patterns. Despite that, there was something about his demeanor that seemed to scream post-human, _mutant_, to me. And I could use a side-kick, or whatever the supervillain equivalent to one was. Probably a minion.

One day he folded a parking ticket into something I thought was supposed to be a cricket, and I thought I heard it chirp. It was only for a second or two, but when I heard his receipt-made swan flap its wings, on its own, I knew that I hadn't been hallucinating the first time.

It didn't make sense, though, because no mutation I'd ever heard of could literally bring paper to life. And even if it could, there would be no reason for the security guard to still be a security guard. I'd heard of people not noticing that they'd mutated, but I couldn't see how that would be the case here.

Watching him further didn't answer any of my questions, and I was verging on just asking him how he did what he did.

In the end I decided it would be better if I tested him before we talked. So I slipped into the store, hiding among the other, _normal_ customers. He didn't seem to notice me, when any mutant worth his salt learns to recognize the rest of us fairly soon after manifesting. So I grabbed the first thing I saw, a gold chain I might have admired the workmanship of under normal circumstances, stuffed it in my pocket, and left.

I was stopped at the door by the security guard. I made to dodge around him and leave anyway, but he grabbed a piece of long paper and turned it into a sword. I fell for the ground, just soon enough to avoid having my ear cut off by the sword, which seemed plenty sharp enough to do the job.

"I have a job offer for you," I said, when it became clear that I wasn't going to be decapitated anytime soon. The security guard just glared at me until I handed back the gold chain.

"No," he said when I was finished.

"It's very well paying, and will grant you a greater chance to use your powers."

"No."

My mother had taught me better than to argue with people who'd demonstrated themselves to be stronger than I was, so I promised not to bother him anymore, and left.

Most of the people who mutated changed their jobs. I guess most of us weren't actually happy with the way we'd spent spent our lives pre-manifestation. In that way, although he was incredibly powerful, the security guard wasn't really one of us after all.


End file.
